How Google Voice Search works? Is there an API for that?

Question

I\'m not sure if this is the right site for this question, but I was wondering how the voice activated search on Google\'s homepage works. Does it use Flash, some kind of pl

Answer 1

It's using HTML5 speech input via <input type="text" x-webkit-speech />

as the name suggests, this only works in webkit. Not sure if there are alternatives for other browsers.

See http://jsfiddle.net/xYB3n/

Answer 2

A nice wrapper for the Web Speech API is available here: talater.com/annyang.

This library allows you to easily bind functions to voice commands, eg:

annyang.init({
    "help": function() {$("#help").show();}
});
annyang.start();

Answer 3

It's available to anyone. There's more information here:

http://chrome.blogspot.com/2011/04/everybodys-talking-and-translating-with.html

and an example here: http://www.web2voice.com/chrome-speech-input.html

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks the lack of a permissions prompt feels a little bit big-brother-esque.